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Hello to all. I have a question about suspension alignment. The car in question is a 1999 Buick Riviera with the supercharged 3800 v6 engine. I bought this car recently (used obviously). 82k miles and owned by a little old lady. Literally. I became concerned with the handling. I replaced struts and shocks and while improved, the handling was still a bit weird over some bumps. That is, the rear end of the car would tend to kick to the left or right over some pavement bumps. And the ride was controlled but harsh. I decided that new tires were in order along with a four wheel alignment.
Well the tires (Yokahama Avid) and alignment cured the handling and ride quality woes. The tire shop informed me that all of the toe settings were off and these were set to factory specs. However, three wheels still have camber specs that are out of range, and to correct, it requires the dreaded trip to the dealer.
My question: is a camber setting that is a bit out of spec a big deal? The out of range readings are all about .5 degree too negative All the camber readings are negative (I believe this means the top of the wheel is tipped inward slightly) but three are about one half a degree too negative.
I’m thinking that for everyday driving, this is not going to be a big deal. Any expert advice out there?
Lastly, I am amazed how tires that appear good, with lots of tread and no unusual wear, can be so bad when they get old.
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It sounds like the shop was too lazy to do the alignment the right way.
Camber is a direct wear angle and should be set to where it is supposed to be otherwise with negative camber the inside shoulder of the tire will wear faster than the outer shoulder. Also this could pose some handling issues under certain conditions since the weight of the car is now mostly on the one side of the tire.
As long as you rotate the tires often it should be okay.
Tires get harder as they age, the rubber dries out and becomes brittle, so just because a tire has good tread does not mean that is is a good tire.
I had one of our suppliers send me a tire that was 9 years old and when I saw it I called them and sent the tire back, It was new had never been put on anything but was so old that I wasn’t going to install it.it is important to have the camber set with in specs.
This camber adjusting bolt kit should cure your adjustment
issues.You can google the kits.The alignment shop should have
known this. Find another shop to have them install the cam bolts.http://www.ingallseng.com/35150-camber-adjusting-cam-bolt.html
Thinking they were “too lazy to do it correctly” is completely untrue. Most front wheel drive vehicles do not have a camber adjustment for the front wheels. The camber (sometimes) can be equalized by loosening the cradle bolts and shifting it to one side or the other. In a vehicle that old the camber may be out because of worn ball joints, worn bushings, worn springs, bent strut(s), or worn strut bearing(s). If all of these parts are in working order the only way to adjust camber is to either drill out the spot welds on the strut tower and re-position the strut, grind out the lower strut mounting bolts to make them oblong, or replacing the lower strut mounting bolts with under sized bolts to allow a small amount of movement. Most shops (like mine)do not do modifications like these because of the type of insurance they have. If your camber is less than 5 degrees out, it is fine and will not cause excessive or uneven tire wear. Toe is the most important thing to worry about.
As I stated (too lazy) all of the ways you mentioned are acceptable ways of adjusting camber. Most shops do these “modifications” to get the alignment right. I think you are getting fed a lot of BS by people who do not care about the customers as long as the check clears. I agree with college man find a shop that wants you as a happy and returning customer.
Are they .5 degrees over maximum or ideal? Really .5 degrees isn’t much if it’s still within the limits. If it’s outside the limits you could get inside tire wear.
I would find someone to do it correctly. As mentioned the engine cradle can be moved but that would only fix one side and make the other side worse.
I usually grind the bolt holes in the lower strut to achieve what i need.
No. Not “too lazy.” My shop does not do custom work. Which that is. My shop also does care about the customer, otherwise I would not be working there. We adjust anything that can be adjusted without altering the manufacturer’s original design. And like I said there are other things that can off-set the camber, which we check before EVERY alignment. None of this is an indication of laziness.
You shift the cradle to equalize the camber not to correct one side or the other. By equalize I mean if one side is 7 degrees negative and the other side is 3 degrees positive, you shift it so both sides are at 2 degrees negative. This will eliminate any wander over bumps and excessive tire wear.
Thanks very much for all the information. I have learned a great deal.
I believe the tire shop that performed the alignment explained that the camber is not adjustable on the Riviera. Thus the need for modification. And I believe the policy of this shop is not to do mods.
In terms of actual specs, if I read the graphic printout correctly it would seem that the ideal camber is zero degrees for all four wheels. The actual is RF neg .4 degrees, LF is neg 1 degree, LR is neg .8 degree, and RR is neg 1.3 degrees. Again from the print out, the green zone, or acceptable tolerance is plus or minus .7 degrees. camber
Shocks and struts are new, but tie rod ends and ball joint are all OEM. With the weight of this car in the front end, I would assume there has been some wear, but happily the appearance of the underside of this car is pristine. I believe it was driven very little in winter.
I am intrigued by the replacement bolts that make the camber adjustable for this car. Thanks college man! Do these bolts replace the OEM bolts that go through the control arm bushings? If so, I think I need eight of them?
Another interesting factoid: I drive another GM G-body car, a 1996 Olds Aurora. I also replaced struts on this car, and found that the camber on the Aurora IS adjustable as the lower strut bolt hole that fixes the strut to the steering knuckle is oblong to allow for camber adjust. The Riv struts don’t have this eliptical hole for the lower strut bolt. As mentioned by wysetech, I could grind the lower strut holes and take it back in. At least on the front. For the rear, the control arms are more of a trailing arm kind of deal, so the camber fiddling is not so obvious, at least to me.
And for full disclosure, before alignment, the toe angles were all out of spec. Again, if I read the sheet correctly, spec is 0 to 0.2 degrees toe in (?), and all the wheels were out of spec somewhat, except the RR which was .67 degrees toe in. I think the combo of old hard tires and the way out LR was the cause of the weird sideways shuffle of the rear of the car over certain pavement bumps.
I believe given the slight amount of driving that I do and the fact that the camber is out but not very much, I’ll try living with the car as it is. It now handles fine, for what it is, and probably the tires will need replacement some years hence due to age rather than from tread wear, which is the story for the previous tires.
Thanks again everyone! Super helpful. Grace and Peace to all.
Toe being way out in the rear will cause it to “dog track.”
I know you said you replaced the struts but, did you replace the springs as well? The springs are what supports the weight of the vehicle. And if the vehicles ride height is lower than spec due to worn springs then camber will be affected.
As far as those bolt kits you can get them thru the dealer. And I believe you only use one per wheel, so you would only need four. I may be wrong about that though.Try looking up how to measure ride height. Every car has a different procedure. If the ride height is lower than spec you may need new springs (unless you replaced the springs with the new struts.)
No, I did not replace springs, on front or rear. Very good point on ride height and its influence on camber.
Also, I think I figured out that the camber adjustment bolts are to replace one of the bolts that fix the strut to the steering knuckle. At least that is the arrangement on the front. For the rear, I will dismount one of the wheels and take a look and report back.
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